Book Reviews: Improvisation – A Practical Guide

It's always useful as a drama teacher to have a range of ‘go to’ improvisation guides on your shelf when you start introducing students to devising, and when encouraging them to build their confidence developing scenes and characters on stage without reliance on script.

Improvisation – A Practical Guide by Jason Moran goes into great detail about the history of improvisation. It includes 10 detailed chapters on improvisation in more depth, should you need this, and houses an index of games at the end. If you are an actor or director who is working on a play and you have the time and space to collaborate with your ensemble to work around the script, or to devise your own piece, having sufficient rehearsal time to explore these ideas with the help of improvisation is great. This book will help you to use improvisation to deepen your connection with the audience and think about improvisation beyond the stage.